“Where Words Fail, Music Speaks”

August 5, 2014

“Where words fail, music speaks”

Hans Christian Andersen

We invite you to experience an uplifting cinematic exploration of music and the mind. Alive Inside’s inspirational and emotional story left audiences humming, clapping and cheering at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival, where it won the Audience Award.

Alive Inside follows social worker Dan Cohen as he fights a broken healthcare system to return a deep sense of life to those living with memory loss.

Filmmaker Michael Rossato-Bennett chronicles the astonishing experiences of individuals around the country who have been revitalized through the simple experience of listening to favorite music. He reveals the uniquely human connection we find in music and how its healing power can triumph where prescription medication falls short.

The film features illuminating interviews with experts including renowned neurologist and best-selling author Oliver Sacks (Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain) and musician Bobby McFerrin (“Don’t Worry, Be Happy”).

Invite Music & Memory into Your Life

“Music is an outburst of the soul.”

Frederick Delius

Dan Cohen’s Music & Memory program has a simple yet profound tenet: Figure out what music people love and let them listen to it.

This involves creating a personal playlist. Ideally, each song evokes an interesting and positive memory.

Here’s a song from my playlist:

I am pushing my cart through the neighborhood grocery store when the background music permeates my thoughts. The strains of Summer Place transport me to my growing up home in Memphis, Tenn. I see myself, age 12, sitting at my beat-up old upright piano, clunkily accompanying myself as I sing. My mother is perched on the piano bench, singing along. “There’s a summer place,” we croon. We do not have great voices but we sound good together. “Where I’ll be safe and warm.” The song offers a moment of respite during a period when Mom and I are not getting along well. Singing together makes us smile and laugh. And now, in the grocery store, in front of the heirloom tomatoes, I smile as the song envelopes me once again, connecting me with my mother, my childhood home, and that piano I earned by doing chores (including picking bag worms off our neighbor’s bushes for a penny a worm.)

What about you? What are the songs that weave through your heart and into your memory?

“Music is the language of the spirit. It opens the secret of life bringing peace, abolishing strife.” — Khalil Gibran

Deborah Shouse is the author of Love in the Land of Dementia: Finding Hope in the Caregiver’s Journey.

1 Comment

I can’t wait to look up your book. Dan Cohen and the “Alive Inside” video inspired me, as a memory care director, to create LifeSongs recordable scrapbooks. They are a portable tool for Alzheimer’s care. You use pictures and record 12 favorite songs to tell a person’s life story. The book is for reminiscing and also to share who that person is with caregivers. Please see what you think by visiting http://www.LifeSongs.info. Suzanne Lyon